AJO – Transcend

“AJO”, real name Ariong James Oscar is a Ugandan born and raised HIP HOP/ RAP recording artist and song writer.

Born 18th may 1988 to a Dr. Atai Anne and Mr. James Okaali. Ajo has established himself as a vibrant and outspoken rapper with an impressive emulsion of wit, literacy and character in his lyrics a skill which has led many to describe him as an intersection of hip hop talent.

Ajo’s ambition and love for music predates his initiation into the hip hop fraternity, “he always loved music, as a child he used to wake everybody up early in the morning with his humming or chanting away to some orchestra in his mind” – Dr. Atai Anne.

Ajo started listening to hip hop music round the age of 12 shortly after his primary school. He fell in love with the message, the attitude, the freedom, the intricacy and the respect this genre of music commanded. It was during this time that he started to write cover versions to his favorite hip hop songs and gradually he developed his lyrical skill.

In his high school, AJO together with a few of his school friends formed a music group they called Clean Block Gang (C.B.G). Ajo and his peers strongly worked on their music and content development, “he wrote lyrics on almost everything; his locker, his book covers, his jean trousers and every piece of paper he could find” – Abel lubulwa (member of the C.B.G).

Ajo went further to record a couple of songs like; Rap music I sing, Rap city, Take it down easy then he teamed up with one of the best music producers in Uganda, HANNZ TACTIQ, together with whom he did his first radio smash song, NEVER BACK DOWN on which he featured Lethal and Hannz tactiq himself. This song went on to enjoy radio streaming and made it to a music chart on one radio station, HOT 100.

Ajo didn’t stop there; he later got in touch with a former rapper turned producer, Joe Tumwebaze aka J.T founder of Yego productions, a record label and it’s here that AJO fully embraced his passion for a hip hop music career. Mentored by J.T, he mastered his craft and released his first music compilation titled “Rap Music I Sing”, a piece that takes the listener through an in-depth understanding of him as an artist and a human being plus an appreciation of his lyrical and content maturity.

After which Ajo released his break through EP titled No Apologies that got nominated for Album of the year and got him nominated for Rookie of the year in the Uganda HipHop Awards 16.

AJO is definitely a must listen to artist with an ambition and talent enough to be the best rapper in Africa and probably cross continent.

He is one every aspiring rapper should look up to and every old rapper should look out for.

“Transcend”; by definition means to rise above or go beyond; overpass or exceed:

The Transcend music video was shot by Christopher Kobel of Clumsy Media production, make-up done by Reen and the model is Sheila from Wardz modelling agency.

Transcend has a very straight forward video script. We chose to make it as plain as possible to leave room for the viewer to focus more on the message in the song than the viewership.

It also has a couple of abstracts;

where the female model clad in an African Outfit represents Africa, its fragility, culture and Innocence.

Ajo wearing a mask represents the people in the shadows responsible for the African Woes.

TRANSCEND is the first video released off the African Reality Album which is scheduled to drop later this year.

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